Huge win for car owners! All TSBs to be made public.
The Center for Auto Safety just made the NHTSA (US Government) make public the full text of all TSBs from now on. They are the same organization that has petitioned the NHTSA & filed lawsuits to protect car owners over exploding gas tanks & other major safety issues.
Whenever you drive in your car, you are safer thanks in part to a lot of work over the years by this small but very effective consumer advocacy group.

Get notified about new defects, investigations, recalls & lawsuits for the 2003 Dodge Ram 2500:

Unsubscribe any time. We don't sell/share your email.

Helpful websites

Reapir Solution For Your Blend Door Problems - This is a typical problem and alway involves the blend door actuators on all Dodge Rams 2003-2008. The blend door actuators are made of plastic, which after a few years, extreme heat or cold blowing over them , and the typical friction, they break. This leaves the blend doors stuck in a down position. I went through this when I was stationed in Germany. The heater was only blasting out the defrost and nothing on the floor vent. It was cold!! So I ended up finding Heater Treater, ordered the set and did it myself. It does involve a littel cutting in the plenum box, but the money I saved along with the satisfaction was worth it. The kit to replace all the blend doors, which are solidly constructed along with Copper and metal arms, guarantees that it will never fail. One word of advise: because only the blend doors for defrost needed replacing, I only changed them. Bad idea! within 2 months the mid-level function failed and I had ot go back into the dash board. But I was a pro now so not so bad! Change all the doors whether they need it now or not. Eventually they will. Cost of kit was about $275.00, plus the video on how to is on Youtube. Well worth it and Good Luck!

Ram 2500 HD 5.7lV8

Automatic transmission

25,000 miles

A D V E R T I S E M E N T S

How can I fix the heater problem on my 2003 Dodge Ram -2500 it blows cold air barely on my foot. ( the settings are on heat and temp. high) Its a problem especially on cold mornings. Any advice is welcomed. Thanks,

Ram 2500 5.7L Hemi

Automatic transmission

47,000 miles

03 Ram 2500 Hemi. Heat fails to switch flow from feet/vent/defrost intermittently and most frequently will not switch to defrost mode at all. Dealer charged $98 to tell me nothing useful since it didn't register any codes and otherwise it would probably cost $700 so they could troubleshoot under the dash... Overall, it's embarrassing that Dodge's CEO allows crappy plastic parts to be put in the vehicles and then not stand behind them when the $10 savings turns into a consumer nightmare. Made in America should mean something... Too often it means corporate greed and pathetic leadership. I've generally been a huge Dodge Fan but this saga is sad.

Ram 2500

Ram 2500 2500 4WD Diesel Cummins 5.9L Td

Automatic transmission

100,000 miles

A D V E R T I S E M E N T S

I thought at first that I may have an electrical fault in the selector setting dial on the HVAC control knob on the dash because there were times that the HVAC would not switch settings from fan, floor to defrost, or back to the other. This was really only obnoxious at first when it was raining and or in the winter if it was below freezing and I really needed to defrost the windshield. Then it got progressively worse where sometimes with the AC running and the vent selector set to face and floor, the cols AC would only blow out the defrost vents and actually freeze the inside of the windshield. I took it to my local 5 star dealership where they predictably tried to get a code out of it and could not. They tried all of the simple things like checking the fuses and looking under the dash to see if anything was loose. they charged me a diagnostic fee for their time and sent me on my way by telling me that they couldn't reproduce the problem. I searched online of course once I got home and found that there was in fact a widespread problem with what Chrysler calls a "Defective Blend-Door" issue. Although the local dealership claimed to have never had any customers come in with the same problem or symptoms, I was able to find several reports of the same problem, with this same vehicle reported online. After several visits to the dealership and several calls to Chrysler Customer Service, Chrysler finally agreed topay the Dealership for parts and labor if I would agree to pay the dealership $250 for their time since the vehicle was out of warranty. Considering they would have to take my entire dash apart as well as fully disassemble the HVAC box, $250 was a pretty good deal to me, so I accepted the offer. The new blend door works but there is one problem. It is still of the same part number and design as the original part, Chrysler acknowledged the problem with the design of the part, but has done NOTHING to issue a redesigned part that is free from the defects that cause it to fail. So I guess if I have the truck for another 100k miles, this will happen all over again. Hopefully I will still have the truck in another 100k miles. If Chrysler could design and assemble a truck as well as Cummins can do for the Diesel engines that go in them, they might have a good thing going. Dodge wouldn't sell as many trucks of course because they would last too long. But their customers would sure be happy.

Ram 2500 2500 HD 5.9L Ltr Cummins

Automatic transmission

140,000 miles

This is the best truck I've ever owned. I love this truck, but it definitely has a design problem when it comes to the heater door (diverter) hinge. It has now broken three times. Each time while I was snow plowing and using high heat switching from defrost to floor heat. It gets stuck on defrost and believe me, you need heat on the floor here in Minnesota in the winter. It cost me $800 the first two times to fix this (each time) and here I am at round three. This time I'm fixing it myself and custom re-designing the door hinge before putting it back together. Crazy that something so fundamental should cost the vehicle owner any money at all. Heater doors used to outlast the life of the vehicle.

Ram 2500 4x4 Quad Cab Diesel

Automatic transmission

50,000 miles

The dealer wanted over $800 to fix this, the part was $35.00. I bought the part and did it myself, at least 12 hours of labor and a huge, HUGE pain in the ass. Dodge is well aware of this problem and has NOT, I repeat NOT fixed it as of the 2009 model year. They now actually tell people not to change the direction of the air while the fan is on, or the air pressure will break the crappy little door/hinge unit the moves in relation to the air direction selected.

Ram 2500 SLT 5.9L Cummins Diesel

Automatic transmission

50,000 miles

You could turn the fan on, but no air would blow out any of the vents. Found out the problem was that the damper that moves to divert air from the vents to defrost, to the feet, etc. is controlled by vacuum. If the hose goes bad, the damper just closes and you can't get air out from any of the vents. It took a week to fix (the whole dash has to be removed just for them to find the problem, and then order the part.) The day I got it back, I tested it before leaving the dealership. I broke again as I was testing it. Took another week to get another part. Two years later, I can still tell that it doesn't work quite like it should. I am just waiting for it to break again.

About CarComplaints.com

CarComplaints.com is an online automotive complaint resource that uses graphs to show automotive defect patterns, based on complaint data submitted by visitors to the site. The complaints are organized into groups with data published by vehicle, vehicle component, and specific problem.

What's wrong with YOUR car?™

"Autobeef", "What's Wrong With YOUR Car?" & "The Truth About Cars" are trademarks of Autobeef LLC, All rights reserved.

Add A Helpful Link

DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME:
Link must be about this specific problem or it will be deleted — it must be free & helpful, like a video or web page or forum thread about this exact problem.
NO FORUM HOMEPAGES. If you have a for-profit service, contact us.

URLPlease type the entire URL including the 'http://...'TitleDescriptionYour Email Address